Coup de Foudre
by botulism poisoning
Summary: Who is the ghost of a man who lives with Christine in the house by the lake? Raoul de Chagny, face freshly cut up. Who is the safe, warm man who raised her, who Christine wants to return to? Our dear Erik. The sequel to Mon Aimé Eros. EC RC
1. Act 3, Scene 1: Lachrymose Laceration

This is the sequel to **Mon Aimé Eros. **

**READ THAT FIRST TO UNDERSTAND THIS!**

2 year now, is it? Maybe. I am so, so sorry that I have been absent from this world. I gained love, lost love, gained it again. My writing has improved so much! (Well, in my eyes). I hope you enjoy the rest of the story just like you enjoyed the first part.

If you're just now stumbling upon this, I would advise you to read the first book. It is on my old account, Tanglepaw of WindClan. Here is the link to it:

www . fanfiction . net/s/2801410/1/MonAimEros

Remove the spaces and you are in!

So, without further ado...

**Coup de Foudre  
**

* * *

"J'ai eu la vie facile mais je n'servais à rien,

Puis j'ai partagé sa peine,aujourd'hui je suis quelqu'un

Sarah,reine des femmes, devant elle je m'incline

Car je peux voir ce matin un ange dans ma cuisine

Sarah elle est belle mais seulement quand elle est nue "

- Kyo's "Sarah"

* * *

Part 3: You Kiss By The Book 

Act 3, Scene 1: Lachrymose / Laceration

The cold outside was bitter, biting at their skin and tearing at her scalp. She wished for nothing more then dark butterflies; those akin to finding a face in the moon and the next day seeing it sweep away in an eclipse. Those dark butterflies whose wings were much more feather then fragile material in hues of purple and gold. And then she wished for fire, fire to burn away the butterflies and scold the man whose blood was now on her. Fire, she imagined, would dance about him, engulfing his hands, heart, and FACE.

Alas, for that was the sole reason she was here. She was the fire spewed forward to consume a marred face and soul.

The cold outside was bitter, but not as bitter as the cold inside of Raoul.

He had brought them both to a lake, not unlike one next to a door in the wall, not unlike one that holds houses for sirens, but varying in likeness so what would've been a source of familiarity melts to one of freezing oddity.

Raoul opens a door to the cool mansion by the lake, not seeming to be intimidated by the way the house looms so high into the clouds that its' shadow touches the banks of the water, even though those are far off to keep erosion at bay. She, on the other hand, is so scared of the house and what it might hold that her heart beats in her throat.

Without awareness of Christine's terror, Raoul enters the threshold. She is but a rag doll to him now, a tiny plastic peg in the toy car. Or, better yet, the German puzzle box he could never figure out as a kid. Philippe always had to ravel the pieces back together for him.

If he had seen Raoul now, what would Philippe think? Would his thoughts run dry from shock in his own brother's animalistic behavior? Or would the river of his mind overflow with horror upon seeing the new caricature minted onto Raoul's skin?

He knew what Philippe would think. And that was why he led Christine into the first room, one painted sky blue, and pushed her to the floor. That was why he grabbed the dagger that had been lying silent in its sheath and pointed it to her glistening forehead.

"Please, Raoul…" Her voice was shaking. "Don't do this. I can help you, believe me. You can be normal."

"You call this normal? How can I ever be normal again?!" He turned the blade and directed it towards his own face. The skin was like the first stitches Christine had put into the duck: messy, lopsided, and with threads of it hanging out in awkward places. But all of the blood streaming over his lips, flecking his eyelashes, and mixing with his tears made it all seem worse then it actually was… this was what Christine hoped.

Not too long ago they had been running on the edge of the knife, and now, it seemed, they had toppled over. Erik had slashed Raoul's face like one might curtains. Raoul had grabbed Christine and fled.

Christine bit her tongue. "I…" She stopped, and leaned forward. Her hand touched his, and though his skin did twitch, he did not recoil completely. She let her fingers wind around his tense hand.

"Lie down, Raoul. I can find the kitchen and begin to make you tea; that, or also retrieve bandages from a cupboard. You're still bleeding. Do you know this house well enough to tell me where those things are? …Raoul?"

While she had been speaking, Raoul had sunk to his knees. Christine had assumed he was just going into hysterics, but really he had fallen asleep with his hand in hers. Sighing, Christine gently pushed him to the ground, opening his mouth slightly so he would still be able to breathe. His nose, she saw, had taken quite a blow.

She rose to her shoes. Now, finally, she could think. Raoul's injuries had to be seen too; she should call a physician. On the carriage ride to the house she had not seen any houses; Christine figured that if she ran on the road for long enough she'd hit a doctor.

Then there was the simple matter of Erik. His whereabouts, feelings, health status. As she wandered the house, not knowing if she was looking for a way out or bandages for Raoul, she pondered. What had happened to her angel, anyway? Why had he let Raoul spirit her away?

She stopped walking. That last question lingered in her mind. Why had he let Raoul kidnap her? Take her? Take her from him? She was in a stark white room, with chairs pushed to the walls, and a wide window. Through cracks in the window glass the sticky night air escaped into the room. Christine went to that window, pressed her hand to it, and viewed the sparkling lake from her second story perch. Silence was her only companion now.

Tears she hadn't let come before, not even on that long carriage ride, puddle in the dark hollows beneath her eyes. It was one of the first times Christine had ever cried for herself; she had always been too proud to succumb to an act of such self-pity. Tears had always been Erik's thing.

Now she cried. 'Everyday we would count the similarities between us… my pale skin used to be enough to satisfy that thirst, too; his thirst for wanting me to be like him,' Christine mused. 'Now is my mind finally cracking from his games? Is this but another challenge put forward to test me? Is this another spade, another gun, another lake?'

The lake.

It glittered through the leaves, echoing whispers from years gone by. It was all of the black butterflies and Don Juan's and V shaped dresses in Paris. Somewhere, a clock boomed once. The clock's boom sent shivers through her ribcage and reverberated through her skin. She found the latch to the window and opened it.

"Christine… Christine…"

For a moment, she died and went to heaven. Who else knew to say her name with such love that it slipped off of the letters and collected at the bottom of the word? Her nails dug into the window latch. The lake blurred in front of her

"Christine…!"

Raoul's cry matched the one her heart was making. Slammed back into a reality of dying, disfigured men she turned and left her window to cloud.

* * *

Their first night was spent in separate rooms; Raoul had cried himself into what appeared to be a coma and Christine had spent the night by the window. The following days proved to be just as interesting as that. He took to smashing mirrors and she filled her hours with cleaning up the glass. He found books on facial deformities and Christine slipped vodka into his tea to make him forget everything he read. 

The only strain of hope was the scars that wrapped around her flesh. They were the only consistencies in her life. 'Once upon a time,' Christine thought as she stood by the window. The cool breeze, hinting at a chilly afternoon, barely lifted her thick brown curls. 'An angel loved me.'

She looked down to the windowpane. A single piece of rolled parchment rested on the white wood. She unfurled it, knowing instantly whose hand it had come from.

_Tax me of my face and receive your fine_

_See to it for me to be by the clock at nine_

_On the twenty-first ring you shall be mine._

_-Raoul_

So. It had finally happened. Raoul had snapped (even more) and was going to murder her. Drown her in her lake. Hang her from her window. Both ways would be ironic and would satisfy his need for revenge. Oddly enough, Christine wasn't worried. Death never had imposed itself upon her life; not in the sense that it was coming for her.

Erik was coming for her. The beast beneath him threw back its head and whinnied to the open sky that message. Noon had turned to night then daylight had whipped the stars away, and still he urged himself forward. There had been no breaks for food, for water, for anything important. _She_ was what was important. Christine, his Christine, in the manipulative fingers of another madman. When the horse grew tired he went on foot. Then he found another horse and was galloping again.

The moment she left his view his heart rate spiked to astronomical levels and hadn't come down since. Towns whizzed by in his panicked search for her. It was just that he didn't know where to look! That wretched, disgraceful boy could've taken her anywhere!

It is hard to describe how miserable, dejected, horrified, and crazed Erik felt at the moment. Remember that age-old question, the one you must have thought at one point: If my house were burning, what one object would I save? Christine was Erik's object; even Christine's lifeless, rotten cadaver would be Erik's object. _She_ was what was important.

He didn't breathe.

She took a deep breath and followed her ears. The clock was booming once, twice, thrice, four times, five, and she knew her time was slipping away with it. Through her window she had seen the night settle in, and with it settled into her heart quiet determination. Her fingers tugged her skirt up so that she may follow the booming at a better pace.

Six times…

Through a violet-colored room she traveled. It had no windows, but a piano and bookshelves. Also, a fireplace carved into the violet wall. She stopped for a moment to share in its warmth and then was off again.

Ten times…

"_Zut!_" She had lost time. How fast was this clock booming?! It was closer, at least, then it had been before.

At the nineteenth boom, she was standing in a hallway. In that hallway also happened to be the clock. It was giant, and made of the sweetest ebony. A thick bronze pendulum, speckled green from an unknown source, sent its silent swings into the air. Protectively the wrappings of an Egyptian corpse wound their way around the clock, looping and twisting and jumping into the minute hand itself. It was surprising that, even so tightly bound, the clock could still bellow like it did.

Boom! Twenty one times for twenty-one moments that Christine did not dare to think straight. Her eyes, glassy green, now scanned the dimly lit hallway, searching the light gray walls for evidence that she had been sharing a house with another person.

When Raoul did appear, it was not out of a picture frame or a doorway, like she had been expecting. He simply was behind her, examining her the way she examined the clock.

"You… have robbed me of my very identity… of the stamp God gave me to tell his subjects that I was who I was: Raoul de Chagny, viscount, brother. I hope I'm good enough for you now."

Christine had been standing very still while he spoke. Her stillness was broken at his last sentence. Her surprise marked her face as she turned to look at him. Her surprise turned to shock when she saw a mask looking back.


	2. Act 3, Scene 2: Half An Hour

Once again, read the first book to understand this. Thank you.

* * *

What you do and don't believe,

doesn't mean a thing to me.

Who we "are," to some degree,

are the promises we choose to keep.

-Sunday's Best, "In Beats Like Trains"

* * *

Act 3, Scene 2: Half an hour 

She couldn't say "Erik!" for if it was Raoul, then he would be angry.

And she couldn't say "Raoul!" for if it was Erik, then he would be angry.

So Christine just stared at the mask in front of her, into the eyes, drowning in the darkness.

"Christine," The voice rumbled from behind the veil of leather. Christine couldn't help but let her features sag. It was Raoul, in full glory; he wore high trousers, a crisp purple shirt, completed with opaque cufflinks. Her eyes didn't see any of this, though; they were too busy gawking at the mask.

No words were exchanged for a small period of time. Just enough time, coincidently, for the clock to stop moaning its final ticks and tocks. Raoul cleared his throat. "I mean it… that I hope I'm good enough for you…please let me explain."

She did not interrupt him.

"I took you here for a reason. We traveled across the countryside in one night for a reason. At first it was too get what was then believed to be 'my fair share'. Now I only wish to treat you like the lady you are. How long have you been deprived of a real gentleman? One who does not seduce with sights and sounds, but one who does card tricks in the evenings and takes you out for Sunday drives?"

"All my life…"

"Let me become that gentleman. With the face of the monster you love we have no social boundaries to get past, but with my-"

"Raoul," Christine interrupted him now. A lifetime of encouraging her curiosity wouldn't be put to waste just by orders. "I'm afraid I don't understand you. What do you mean, social boundaries?"

Raoul grimaced, the mask upon his face shifting as his face did. "Come, let us sit. I wouldn't want your knees to lock up because I made you stand in a cold hallway."

They went to the blue room, the delicate stillness between them smiling at the change in atmosphere. There, among plush armchairs and rockers, comfort could be found even between strangers. Christine opted for a petite wooden rocker. Raoul went for the Patriarch's throne near the corner of a Persian rug.

It took Raoul a moment to get back on track. He spoke distantly now, eyes on the darkness outside instead of the girl in front of him. "What I meant before was that I'm… I'm… I am glad that what happened to me happened to me. If I were with you otherwise, then there would be pressure between us. A man and a woman, both handsome in their own likes. But if one is ugly and the other not, then there is no hope for anything to occur."

Christine remembered what the daroga had told her lifetimes ago of The Birds and The Bees: Men and women, love, babies, that whole business. Raoul, surely, wasn't implying something like that! For the first time in a long while, she laughed.

Raoul's eyes left the window to flicker back to Christine. She forced herself to do nothing but giggle, but still the very sound seemed to strike Raoul across the head; his eyes were prisms trying to let out nothing but actually omitting every emotion in the rainbow. Why are you laughing at me? His eyes asked.

"It's just that, and this is going to sound silly…"

Go on, his eyes urged.

"It's just that, mask or not, you're still awkward. You're still Raoul. We could've been friends, you know. We still can be. Just promise me you won't become some dark creature because that's what you think I'll like," Christine said, a sad smile on her face. Now she saw beyond the mask—which really was just a play at being Christine's Angel—and saw a scared young man who just wanted Christine to like him.

"That's all I ask of you."

Raoul stood, suddenly. The candles in the room danced, almost going out. Shadows poured across his face, down his chest in rivulets, covering him. "Ask of me? How dare you ask anything of me! I give you a home away from the manipulative fingers of a madman, and you tell me to stop it, Raoul, mon minet, don't protect me! Well, then I won't!"

He raised a shaking finger to point it in her face. She could see, easily now, that he also wore black gloves like Erik had. "And do… not… tell… me… to… not… be… DARK!" The last word he screamed.

"What happened to you being the gentleman I needed?" Christine asked. Inside she was nothing but a puddle of panic (It was the first time she had heard Raoul raise his voice), but outside she tried to use all of the wit Erik had taught her. "Raoul, please, I only ask you to not change! I want the gentleman! I need the gentleman! I would love him!"

The silence was palpable and tasted bittersweet. His eyes, once so charming when they shone in the light, were volcanoes, shooting acid from their pores.

"_All my feelings now grow still_…_ we never have and we never will_… Next time you see tien ange, make a song out of my sorrow. I hear he's quite talented on the pipes." Raoul reached into the shadows and drew out one and then fastened it to his neck. He adjusted the cloak, and went on, "This morning my mind and my heart were warring. At first my mind won and I was to have you on a platter. However, when I saw you by the clock, my heart told me to follow it. 'Be kind to her', it said! 'You love her, don't you?' it said! But now! My mind is clamoring for control again.

"Ask of me anything more and I will show you the darkness that is inside of me. Ask of me anything more and I will not reply until you see the darkness, which is there because my life was taken from me, not because I want to be the one taking lives! Ask of me anything more and I will force you to become mine; and once you are that there is no crossing back. A meeting of the minds, I dare say!"

They stared at each other. Christine felt like someone had poured water over her and frozen her to the rocking chair. Confusion filled her mind. Raoul trembled with his own rage, inner turmoil spilling over.

"Raoul." It wasn't a question, but a statement, one that reminded them that between them now was a deadly pressure, not a tiny crack that could be filled with cocking eventually. So they had been balancing on a knife before, with all three of them: Erik, Christine, and Raoul. Take away but one and you get a constant gunpoint situation.

He left her. She turned left and escaped the room.

Once safe in her room, Christine wept. She grabbed at her skirt and used it as a rag to scrape away her tears. Her breath was coming out much to fast, and her shoulders shook, sending tremors down into the hardwood floor. The dizzyingly orange walls closed in on her. Crawling, she pulled herself to her bed, sobbing into her blankets once they were close enough.

Raoul, who had always seemed so docile, had turned into something horrible because of her. If Christine didn't exist, then Raoul would still be a happy man. He would probably be engaged to Meg by now! She could see their happy life fold out in front of her: They would have many petite, blonde children with charming manners, a habit for gossip, and heart-shaped faces.

Oh, Raoul's face, Raoul's beautiful face… gone because of Christine.

Dangerous thoughts crept into her head. She indulged in the sinister wonderings. The lake… cool, crystal… everything comes back to the lake.

Before she could act on a single one, she fell asleep, tear-littered cheeks pressed into her pillow. When she woke up she was strangely warm. It was too early in her life for hot flashes, but yet her skin wore red splotches, and her cheeks were flushed. She stared at herself in the small sliver of mirror glass that she had saved from Raoul's attacks and barely recognized the girl looking back.

Dreams drifted through her head like a disconnected train. None of them tickled her recollection completely. As she tried to recall at least one of them, Christine put her small mirror on her vanity. Then, with tiny steps, she went to the white kitchen.

The day passed slowly, like all of them did in the mansion. Christine made Raoul and her breakfast, for the kitchen, even though it looked like no one had occupied the house for years, was completely stocked with fresh goods. She left his plate by the green door. She hardly saw him during the day.

To put meaning into her life, Christine took to reading books. They seemed to occupy the house as much as her; shelves of the creatures lined the walls in almost every room, no matter its color. The first book she read in her new home was a tiny gilded book by Charlotte Dacre, titled 'Hours of Solitude.' Pun intended. Christine picked it for its title.

Words had long ago been carved onto her flesh (Erik's, Erik's, Erik's)—now words were being carved into her heart. Every romantic poem made her smile, cry, and anger all at once. Never before had she chanced to read a poetry book, what with their loaded language and general sappiness. This volume had opened the door to a world unseen before, and Christine was forever in debt to Charlotte Dacre.

Folly found in the pages is as much comfort as madness in the heart of angels. Well, not exactly. When the poems spoke of love, she thought of but one mask: the Original. If Charlotte wrote of kisses Christine thought of future kisses and not of the one she had already had. "A kiss of love refin'd," She murmured to herself, quoting the book. "And blends the bliss with mind."

Timidly,she thought of Erik. A certain thrill went through her from thinking of Erik in such a way. It was certainly something new. Her lips had only touched his cold mask before, never upon his lips. It would be nice to kiss him, Christine decided. She remembered with a smile that Erik's lips were actually very in tact… God's gift to her! Her heart raced from the sudden unsought of emotions. Was this the type of love that Erik incorporated into his music?

Her eyes burned into the paper, turning the grain to dust and evaporating the ink right off the page. Over and over she read that poem. When she read it for the twentieth time, something clicked in her brain.

"_And blends the bliss with mind…"_

"_A meeting of the minds, I dare say!"_

A chill ran down her spine and she snapped her book shut. Raoul could not have known that she would pick this book off of all of the shelves in the mansion! There was no possible way anyone could've guessed at that! It was just a coincidence that her favorite poem held the same meaning as the one behind Raoul's words.

Timidly, she thought of Raoul. So their minds might meet. If they did, would that stop him from becoming a phantom? If that were true, then Christine would march into a lifetime of Raoul's kisses. She would do anything to help reverse Raoul's fate.

With a quill pinched between determined fingers, she wrote Raoul a letter. When the last sentence was written, Christine took it and slid it beneath his door, where it would wait for him to read it.

These are the words that Christine carved into Raoul's heart:

Darkest Raoul,

I cannot write in riddles like you. As always, my words and feelings appear easily. So I shall be brief and blunt:

I long for a connection between us. I want my mind to know yours like it knows the well-written words of British romantics. I will not ask you to meet me at the clock at eight, tonight. I simply will not.

But I will be waiting there.

Yours if you so wish that to be,

Lightest Christine


	3. Act 3, Scene 3: You're Just Like a Dream

* * *

A/N: If you have not heard The Cure's 'Just Like Heaven', then I would suggest strongly to go listen to it now as you read this. It's what tied this chapter together. And there is a spoiler in that song if you can find it. Thanks for reading, as always!

* * *

Spinning on a dizzy edge

I kissed her face and kissed her head

And dreamed of all the different ways I had

To make her glow

"Why are you so far away?" she said

"Why won't you ever know that I'm in love with you

That I'm in love with you"

-The Cure, "Just Like Heaven"

* * *

Act 3, Scene 3: You're Just Like a Dream 

Erik felt like his whole body was going stiff. He had been sitting in the chair for much too long, his eyes half open, staring at a fireplace. He was in Christine's old room… or, in least what was left of her room. In one spurt of anger he had trashed the whole place. The chest of drawers fell first, the glass on top of it shattering into a million tiny pieces of pain across the carpet. That meant the carpet was destroyed too; who would want a carpet with glass embedded in it? He had meant to just pull the carpet up from the floor, revealing the hardwood flooring, but that had made the book stand quiver perilously and drop the tiny porcelain ballerina. She did not survive the fall.

The rest of Christine's old room was annihilated in a matter of moments, everything either shattering or toppling over.  
When Erik passed the room by he felt guilt. But what could he do about it? He knew that if he dared to touch anything besides the chair he had put in there later, he would be bound to destroy it. And he did not want any more blood on his hands.

So instead of fixing things, Erik wallowed in it all.

Finally, he got up, fixed his tie, and decided to go to his casket. As he walked to his room, passing through cold corridors, he tried to work some of the stiffness out of his knees. His mind began to wander then, with nothing to preoccupy it. Erik tried to keep it this way: It was such a peaceful lack of sensation.

Sadly, he did need something to think about. If he didn't lasso his thoughts in at once, they would run free, and probably run into something that would cause him pain.

However, to Erik's surprise, a memory was dusted off and brought forth from the back of his mind.

It was a memory from years ago, when Christine was still with him. Years ago? Or was it days? It felt like a lifetime. Erik couldn't see faces, but at least he could hear people's voices. That was all that really mattered.

Erik recalled a peculiar talk he had had with the Persian, his first and last real friend. He knew now that the daroga was far away, flown away like his nightingale, but in his mind he saw every detail of the man: His slightly shabby formal attire, glittering brown eyes, and tight-lipped smile. Oh, and how his voice sounded when he warned Erik that whatever he was doing was stupid beyond words.

It had been another dark day five stories below the Opera house. Christine had been fast asleep in her real bed. The daroga was there, keeping him company.

"Erik, may I ask you a question?" The daroga asked.

"You just did," Erik said breezily, not looking up from the newspaper.

"Another one, then?"  
"You may."

"What would you do if I died? I know you would do many drastic things if Christine died—stop looking at me that way, I'm not planning to kill her. Back to the point…if I suddenly died, what would you do? What would you feel?"

Erik paused, his normally cool composure faltering. He would feel horrible if the daroga died. Horrible… and relieved, for the daroga connected him to his darkest hours: the time he had spent in Persia.

Instead of revealing his almost happiness, Erik replied sensibly, "I would figure out your will, tie up all of your loose ends and debts to people, and publish an article in the obituary. I might even sell your house. I might even live in it. How is that?"

The daroga then did something very interesting, something he had picked up from Erik. He smiled cryptically for his response.

"No, really, what do you think?" Erik demanded.

"I think that would suit us both quite well, Erik."

That was the last of the memory. Erik had reached his room, the door swinging open for him without a creak. He strode into it. His eyes went to the black and red drapes, which now seemed to mock him instead of comfort him like they had before. Pulse spiking, wanted to rip the drapes off, to feel the torn silk slip through his fingers and into a defeated puddle on the floor. He wanted it so badly, but yet the voice, Erik's almost silent voice of reason, decided to pipe up and whisper: _Christine's room. Christine._

That was all it took to make his anger U-turn into sadness. Why was he such a source of devastation? Why did everything he touched either run from him with some boy or tear apart? Or both? These were the questions that wrought him the most pain, for they were the ones with no answers.

Erik went to his the coffin. Erik's gloved hands swung the lid up and he almost started to get in the coffin. Almost, but then those damn black and red stripes taunted him again and he wasn't tired anymore.

What to do, what to do? Erik put on the mask. Put it on, took it off, put it on. What to do, what to do?

Erik played dress up like he had as a child. A dark blue jacket over a periwinkle button-up collared shirt, with a silver and green tie covering his throat and the buttons. Dark brown trousers with a silver belt, for he had no waist that could hold up the pants alone. He actually looked normal, besides the fact that there was no skin exposed.

A walk about the town sounded liked a good enough idea. He was in need of food, also, since Erik couldn't even remember the last time he had eaten. Probably before his grand quest to find Christine. Which had ended in him back in the Opera house, cursing her and trashing her room.

He grabbed his wallet, then stopped, and threw it down. He never paid for meals, or supplies. What was getting into him lately?

Erik took one of his lesser-used passages from the cellars, the cool air brushing against his cheeks as he moved swiftly.

Erik ended up in an alley snug between two looming buildings. Gloomy gray clouds hung over Paris like thick drapes over a stage. Dirty rain lined the streets, collecting in pools at drains. Erik breathed in the fresh air. These rare expeditions were nice. The daroga always said that it would do Erik good to get out more.

The opera ghost decided he would like to eat first. He went to his favorite restaurant, 'de Peu Comme Paradis', taking his time in walking down the busy streets. With his hat tipped forward, casting his mask in shadow, he looked just like any other Parisian man making his way down the streets.

_Christine. _

Golden eyes widened in pain as he thought of her name, voice, beauty, ability to love. 'She's happy with her boy,' He told himself, willing his heart to keep working. 'She's happy, for once in her life. Life with me must have been so horrible for her. No wonder she fell for him so quickly. They are happy. No, I don't care about 'they'. _She_ is happy. Happy. For once in her life.'

Erik closed his eyes.

'Why is it that the one moment she finds happiness is the one moment in her life she is without me?'

The casket welcomed him like an old friend. He fell into its' embrace, crying without tears. Dehydration always did make his body seem even foreign. Lost in his own skin, Erik cried out Christine's name, mask and silk drapes and room and five stories and an Opera house and time and age difference and his deformity and Erik muffling his cry.

Christine's eyes shot open.

Her hands went to her chest, where she could only feel a beating heart. But a moment ago hands had been around her, holding her with trembling fingers, crying her name into her lips.

She had fallen asleep in her chair and had a nightmare, end of story. Shaking her head, Christine decided that now only thoughts of Raoul would enter her head. She would serve him like the lady that he had wanted her to be.


	4. Act 3, Scene 4: I Just Want

A/N: I took my own little time writing this chapter, didn't I? Sorry about that, truly. Life gets hectic around Christmas. But look, ma! The chapters are getting longer!

Oh, and by the way: If you don't like Raoul by the end of this chapter, or at least like him a bit more then you did before (Or at least don't call my!Raoul 'fop fop foppipants'), then you don't have a soul.

Yeeeeeaaa. Review? ♥

* * *

Alas, time moves on crutches,

Stifled by loneliness, I suffocate in its tomb,

Won't you slake my thirst just a moment,

Take this empty glassed heart and fill it with you.

-Gabriel Frost, "Caress of Abscence"

* * *

Act 3, Scene 4: I Just Want 

She chose her words carefully when she was around him. She couldn't just say 'Read it to me again', because that was too pushy. And asking him of anything was still out of bounds. So Christine lifted her eyes to his and told him with the glassy green orbs that she wanted to hear the poem once more.

Raoul nodded, and then began.

They had almost mastered the art of speaking without speaking. They conversed with touches, looks, smiles or frowns. Christine had never spoke so little in her entire life; Erik's world had been constantly shattering and reassembling, with each in turn loud. Raoul's world was so small and quiet that you could blink and miss it. Christine found Raoul's world to be dreadfully…

_Peaceful._

He was still reading the poem to her: "Was it vision, or a waking dream?" They could spend hours like this, with Christine laying on the fine Persian carpet and Raoul in his overly large armchair. Raoul opened his mouth to say the last sentence, but Christine beat him to it. "Fled is that music: -do I wake or sleep?"

While they continue to pretend that they were normal, let us review what lead up to this. Christine had slipped the note beneath his door and waited until eight. Then she went to the clock.

Incidentally, Raoul was there already when she had arrived, a book in hand.

His eyes, still the color of Forget-Me-Nots, had a renegade twinkle in them that night. "John Keats," He had said as he held up the book. "I have a feeling that you might like him."

"I think I've heard of him…" Christine couldn't help but smile. His attitude was fetching, demeanor pleasant. The smile bloomed, making the young woman look radiant. So was this the gentleman he had promised at first? What a nice change from the dark, disfigured men she thought filled her world.

Raoul flipped open the book and let Christine see the page. "Ode to a Nightingale?" She said softly, swirled-patterned fingertips feeling each indentation on the grains of the old paper. Christine had indentations, too, she noted.

"Come, let us be off." Raoul always was in such a hurry to get out of that almost empty hallway. As they left, the hands on the clock whispered 8:01 PM. When they were done reading it was well past midnight. Christine's shoulders curved downward, a yawn replacing poetry in her mouth. Raoul let her yawn, not commenting nor showing any emotion at all. His eyes seemed just as blank as the material that covered his face.

"Christine?"

"Yes?"

"Where did you learn to cook?"

"What?" Of all the questions Raoul could have asked, Christine expected that one least of all. "Raoul, what silliness! I learned at school, where I learned everything else."

Her answer was barely registered in his mind; he still looked like he was watching a sunset or something else daze inducing instead of having a conversation.

Christine was the picture of emotion. Her teeth bit her lower lips, not hard enough to draw blood, except hard enough to reopen chapped spots. She lifted her torso off the rug, weight all on her palms. "Raoul, I am going to ask you a question now. I hope that's okay."

There. A smile. Blistered lips like the sun escaping the clouds. When those lips moved, it was rays of light into her. Perhaps because it was the only one she heard, recently Raoul's voice had that affect on her. "Okay." One golden ray.

Christ nervously pushed a curled lock of hair from her eyes. "Can I go out tomorrow, out of the house?"

The sunshine spluttered to a halt. Raoul, for a moment, looked furious, as if they were transported to a week ago, when the blood on Christine's hands had been fresh. Christine dared not to look away from the fury; for that, she watched as the anger turned to mild interest as the seconds ticked by.

"That's fine," Raoul said, resting his masked cheek on a hand. Head bowed, Christine murmured her thanks. Her heartbeat was still racing from that brief flash of anger. If Raoul's happiness was her only sunlight, then his sorrow was her oxygen. And Erik… no. She couldn't think of him right now.

She had to focus on Raoul.

"You could come with me, if you want," Christine bubbled. He shook his head, chuckling at the idea.

"I?" His chuckle was violent. "Not I. Delusions are for those with lesser problems."

Apparently, that riddle was her dismissal. Though her anger sparkled in her stomach, clawing up to her throat in an attempt to form disgusting words she could fling out (YOU MONSTER! ERIK WENT OUT WITH ME! ERIK LOVED ME MORE THEN HE HATED HIS FACE!), pity won over. Before she left, Christine let loose a kiss upon Raoul's hand. As her lips swept across the plain of the back of his hand, she tried not to let the mask fill up her eyes, opting to close them innocently. Not because she thought him ugly now did she look away… the answer was simple: When expressing affection to a man in a mask who else did she think of but…

She had to focus on Raoul.

In Raoul's world words were used as gunpowder and everyone had twin pistols in their hands. Nevertheless, peace was so deeply saturated into his being that she felt no fear. "Nevertheless, I will see you tomorrow."

The one-day Christine had to spend was spent in the rain--as is life. In rain, corsets stick to chests tired of breathing more water then air, hands are cold as they grab at skirts to keep them from skimming staining puddles of mud, and you fumble even as you waltz with your natural dance partner: malcontent.

Christine found herself feeling out of place among the masses. Raoul had stuck her right in the middle of Alison, the town she now lived in, a town she didn't know from Eden. He had lightly touched her shoulder—as if that made up for leaving her—then had melted into the shadows. His eyes were still on her, though. She could feel them. Knowing this, Christine masked the gently rising panic swelling in her throat and worked her way down to wet shop after wet shop.

By the time she was done shopping her skin was thoroughly saturated with rainwater. The knowledge that Raoul was somewhere, watching her, had been placed on the backburner. The moment her hands touched her new pair of gloves her mind was spiraling towards different directions.

Gloves. A garment of clothing that covers the hands and forearms from the chill. All of her gloves had always bore an E where her palm met the blue trail of arteries on her arm.

The new pair was made out of plain pink material. There, in the rain, Christine pulled them on. The pink turned to a dark rose as the water on her arm met the once-dry material. Christine's found herself trembling.

"Mademoiselle?" The man who had sold her the gloves, whom she hadn't thought could speak French, said. "Are you… are you okay?"

The tone of his voice felt foreign to her ears. The way he shaped his vowels was much too hard! Oh, how she wished she could respond. Oh, how she died inside to teach him how to speak properly. Her one link to reality as the rest of her jumped ship was the pain, circling her fingernails as they dug into her palms, straight through those pretty pink gloves.

He was touching her shoulder, the foreigner. He was saying things, that brainless foreigner, pushing the shovel deeper into her grave. The foreigner removed the dirt that had been filling her to the brim. With each letter, an _a_, a _r_, an _e you all right_, robbed her grave of its filling. She was opening.

He touched her shoulder and it didn't make up for the Erik had left her.

A sob rose from deep in her throat, and with all her might she squeezed it from her throat. When it was gone her breathing slowed considerably; being reverted to her old self, the girl whose side Erik never left, left her breathless. WHY? Why had he given up on her? Why had he given up on her? She finally loved him like he had always wanted and he let her slide! Did he not want her, breathless, sobbing for him? Hadn't that been the point?

Eyes were burning on her back. Was it his? Could she even tell? The pain of the sob (Truly, it had ripped at the seams), along with the madness of loneliness that had been building for days, along with that damn foreigner who still insisted on throwing words at her, made her believe that those eyes belonged to Erik.

"You're back." Her lips even trembled as she spoke. Tiny rivulets of water trickled over her mouth, drops sliding between her teeth and causing her words to be caught between gurgles. If it was hard to speak with water in your mouth, Christine didn't notice. It was rapture to even play with the idea that her guardian was looking at her.

"Who? Who is back?" The foreigner looked about. Silly man. Only those who he loved could see him. She could see him now. Every shadow bent to a curve appeared to her as Erik's shoulder. Not to mention each white glint of a raindrop, which somehow reminded Christine of a mask. He was waiting for her to prove that she was worthy of loving him. Then she would see him too, fully.

Christine slid off her gloves, _shluck, shluck_. The foreigner took her right open hand, wrapped it in his, and hissed, "Enough! Come with me, Mademoiselle, we must get you warmed at once!"

Before, Christine would've gladly gone to tea with him, not caring if Raoul would've had to come and drag her from his house, kicking and screaming and still sipping at her Earl Grey all the way. New Christine, or should we say, Reverted Christine only met his grasp with her on and tugged the foreigner closer. It was easy, when the room between them was only centimeters wide, to kill him.

Through the whole process, she did not let go of his hand. Not even as the blood fill onto her spade did she let go. She let go of him only when she was finished, set him back down into his chair, tipped his chin down to hide the slash.

Christine had been lucky. If she had dared to slice his neck on any other day the daylight would've revealed her sin. Lady Fate would not have that, and rain washed away the blood the moment it touched his dark shirt. The rain had also kicked up haze to make the foreigner appear as if he was resting.

He hadn't screamed. He had known what was happening as it had happened. In his eyes, fair green like the grape groves of his homeland, had been no fear.

For that, she gave him back the gloves, laying them across his shoulder, there, a pair. And then, calmly, Christine began to walk away.

_Bravo, bravo, bravissimo…_

"Christine! Christine!"

His hands were rough against her hands, not at all like the foreigner's. He pulled her into the shadow, against the wall, making her drop the spade. She cried out for her spade, but he made no move to return it to her. All too rough, his hands pinned her to the bricks black with grime.

"Christinehowcouldyou?" Raoul said it all in one breath, voice tense, painful, just like his hands.

People flowed around them, ignorant to the scene going on. Maybe that was why Raoul had no problem being with her in public. Irony aside, Christine couldn't seem to look away from him now, captivated by his very blue eyes.

"You just had to, didn't you? That's your excuse, I'm sure! 'He would've wanted me too… oh, I'm so alone, trapped in a world of mad men, and oh! I'm not just as mad as them!'" He was yelling at her, pushing her away, taking himself to lean against the back of a stall. His hand cradled his face and he bent over, the soft gray cloak tied to his shoulders tenting his body. Christine turned to the bricks and felt a familiar sob building in her chest.

This time, it came out in the tiniest, most delicate tears. She wasn't even trying to seem extra feminine to curb Raoul's anger—there was just a filter on sadness now, allowing only small units to travel out at a time. To the plain eye, Christine's tears would've been lost in all of the rain on her face. To Raoul's eyes, so very bright blue, he saw each tear like it was defined by a great black outline.

"I miss him," Christine whispered into the wall.

"Who?"

"You. Him. Erik. I don't know… not anymore."

There was shuffling behind Christine. Slowly she turned, just as the sun split the storm clouds. The last drops of rain settled into puddles. Roaul wasn't wearing the mask anymore.

Now he wore but that gray cloak, a loose shirt that fell around him like fog, and the rest she couldn't even register because it was too far away from his face for her peripheral vision to pick up and dear God, how could anyone ever think that face was ugly? The skin was scabbing over horribly, making it seem like the left side of Raoul's face was at war with the right. However, it seemed so utterly _Raoul_.

"What do you want from me?" He asked, forefingers clenching around the eyehole of his mask.

Somewhere, someone screamed, and neither cared to comment on it.

"I want… Someone who will hold me when I get scared then scare me when they hold me too long. I want someone who is always there but never wants to be there, wants to be with me, always. I want to hear my someone crying for me, ripping apart at the seams because he wants to rip me apart and put me back together just in the order he wants me to be in. I want…"  
The name was alive between them; She might as well have shouted it at the top of her lungs (And her lungs scaled great heights, as you should know by now). It would've been a 'moment' there hadn't been people bumping them constantly, yelling to each other about "Murder! Murder! Murder of a foreigner!"

"What do you want?" Christine echoed curiously. Surprise passed over his mottled features; then, slowly, Raoul smiled.

"I want Christine Daae. She's all I've ever wanted—" He was lying! "—Since the moment I saw her." He had to be lying! "I also want Christine to stop thinking she has to murder people to feel like she is a person."

Damn! He saw right through her! He could read her like a book! But she smiled anyway, and he smiled, and she giggled, and he put his mask back on. They were having a moment. Christine no longer noticed the weather patterns or the police swarming the area. All she could see was Raoul as he took her back to their mansion in Alison.

* * *

Midnight wound through the halls, slowly stitching ripped peopled back together. Raoul sat vigil by Christine's bed. 'I am a monster,' the golden haired man thought. 'I made her cry. And if I hadn't been so cold with her, then she wouldn't have had to kill that man. His death could've been prevented if I had actually talked to Christine instead of locking her away in a tower and expecting her to be happy with it.' 

Christine looked peaceful as she slept. Empty, but at least there was no tears. Raoul would prefer an emotionless Christine to one so passionate that she was slitting throats left and right.

Whenever he questioned something as a child, Raoul had been encouraged to go seek his answer. His siblings had raised him that way. The Chagny Troupe was what the neighborhood called the various sisters and two boys, laughing as they said the name, for there was not a more inquisitive bunch in the entire world. Monsieur Chagny had always been so quiet after Raoul had born… after his wife died… Raoul knew that he was supposed to be quiet, too. Sadly, because of his silence, Monsieur Chagny lost his son's respect. No one wants a father who stays inside pouring over poetry instead of outside teaching you how to make a slingshot.

Poetry. His teenage years were intertwined with it. Monsieur Chagny had sent Raoul to boarding school the moment his voice dropped. In those quiet nights spent alone in a room far, far away from home, Raoul had turned to poetry as a way to feel a connection to his father. Just because he didn't respect him meant not that Raoul didn't love him desperately and crave for acceptance.  
"Father, I'm studying poetry. I'm thinking of becoming a patron of the arts with my inheritance. The money Grandpa-pa left all of us, that is. Father, isn't that grand?" Raoul had sat with the man in the Chagny study.

For all of his time spent reading instead of having a social life, Raoul won a single smile from his father.

He was sure he could reach Christine the same way. Books, poetry, the meanings behind them both were universal. Surely Raoul could forge a connection with Christine via literature. If he could make the man who never smiled smile, he could make the woman who had once smiled smile again.

However much he was like his father in one way, Raoul still failed to be totally like the man. For one thing, Raoul talked to people, even people who were asleep.

"Christine, I will make you love me. I'll be everything you want, one day." With childlike curiosity—it never leaves you—Raoul ran his thumb across her cheek. Her skin was warm.


End file.
